


Tradition

by poisonivory



Category: DCU, DCU - Comicverse, Justice League International (Comic)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-07
Updated: 2012-07-07
Packaged: 2017-11-09 09:38:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/454027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poisonivory/pseuds/poisonivory
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mothers' Day in Chicago.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tradition

It was a nice grave, if that was the appropriate word. Elegant, clearly expensive without being gaudy or tasteless. The grass covering it was brilliantly green and neatly manicured, and there were fresh orchids every week. Booster knew enough about Thomas Kord to recognize his handiwork.

  
_Anya Stepanova Kord  
Devoted wife, mother, and friend_   


Booster hung back as Ted knelt and placed a bouquet of dyed blue daisies on the grave. They’d cost $12.99 at a nearby bodega and were incredibly tacky.

They had been, Ted swore up and down, his mother’s favorite kind of flower.

Ted said something to the grave, his voice a low rumble. Booster could’ve made out the words if he’d wanted to, knew Ted wouldn’t mind, but he didn’t try. Instead, he wandered at the edge of the footpath, past Jarvis Kord’s somewhat less-well-maintained and body-less grave, looking along the edge for pebbles.

After a minute Ted stood up, brushing off the knees of his jeans. He never dressed up for the cemetery, and so Booster didn’t either, though his instinct was to wear at least a tie. “She wouldn’t care,” Ted always insisted.

Ma would’ve wanted to see Booster in the most expensive thing he owned. She would have wanted to know that he could _afford_ to wear expensive things. Legitimately, too. But Ma wouldn’t be _born_ for half a millennium, let alone have a grave he could visit.

Booster pressed one of the rocks he held into Ted’s hand, and Ted gave him a grateful smile. They each placed on the headstone, a Jewish tradition Booster had never heard of before he’d met Ted.

“Hey, Mrs. K,” Booster said. He felt weird calling her by her first name when he’d never met her. “I promised Ted I wouldn’t tell you all the terrible things he did this year, but believe me, he was _awful_.” Ted elbowed him, laughing a little, and Booster leaned out of the way. “Seriously! You should be totally ashamed of him. I know _I_ am.”

“Don’t listen to him, Mom,” Ted said. “I’m an _angel_.”

Booster rolled his eyes. “Don’t disrespect your mother by acting like she’s dumb enough to believe _that_.” He shrugged a little, uncomfortable as always with this part. “Uh…if heaven’s not temporal, say hi to my ma for me? Tell her…tell her I love her. And I’m sorry.”

Ted pressed against his side, not putting his arm around Booster or anything; just enough to touch.

“Happy Mother’s Day, Mrs. K,” Booster finished.

“Happy Mother’s Day, Mom,” Ted echoed. He put a hand on the sun-warmed stone. “Ya tebya lyublyu.”

They walked out of the cemetery together, quieter than anyone who knew them would guess they could be. There was a dive of a diner across the street from the main gates; Ted glanced at it, then looked up at Booster.

“Can I interest you in a cup of terrible coffee?” he asked.

“What would Mother’s Day be without it?” Booster replied, and they headed across the street.

It was one of the only times Booster drank coffee, but it was tradition. Ensconced in their usual booth, he told Ted about the time his coach had made him play with a slight concussion, and how Ma had found out and stormed into the locker room and made his 6’3”, 250-pound coach cry, and Ted told him about the time Anya had tried to make an entire Thanksgiving dinner from scratch and set the kitchen on fire and they’d wound up spending the holiday at the Dairy Queen. They weren’t new stories, but they were good stories, and Booster laughed as hard at the mental image of little Ted wielding a fire extinguisher bigger than himself as he always did.

Before he’d met Ted, he couldn’t imagine laughing on Mother’s Day ever again.

They lingered in the diner for a couple of hours, then fetched the Bug. Booster watched the lights of Chicago unfold beneath the viewports as Ted flew. It wasn’t the way he would have chosen to spend Mother’s Day, if he’d had a choice.

But things being what they were, it was the best he could imagine.

**Author's Note:**

> Handy Dandy Russian Translation: "Ya tebya lyublyu" - "I love you"


End file.
